Class in America: social vs. economic

[iris lilies]

I have been watching my dog this week claim space, bones, and mom's attention to maintain his status. He is s uncomfortable with two female bulldogs we are fostering. They challange his idea of who he is, the Lord of the Manor.
Dogs are into status markers. if you have all of the bones, you are king.

[Chicken lady]

LDAHL one thing I have learned is that it is a priveledge of class to ignore or deny it's importance. It is much easier to "fit in anywhere" if you start at the top.

[LDAHL]

I have been watching my dog this week claim space, bones, and mom's attention to maintain his status. He is s uncomfortable with two female bulldogs we are fostering. They challange his idea of who he is, the Lord of the Manor.
Dogs are into status markers. if you have all of the bones, you are king.

The most bones, the most beauteous trophy wife, the most discriminating taste in balsamic vinegar, the most designer-label degrees, the highest level of ascended spirituality, artistic understanding or any other virtue you wish to name or invent. We can't seem to resist marking our territory.

[LDAHL]

LDAHL one thing I have learned is that it is a priveledge of class to ignore or deny it's importance. It is much easier to "fit in anywhere" if you start at the top.

I think that's true, a fish probably doesn't think much about being wet. But I also think there are as many class hierarchies as there are versions of class consciousness. I'm not sure a Brooklyn hipster is competing in the same contest for status as a fighter pilot, a kindergarten teacher, an investment banker or a performance artist.

[ApatheticNoMore]

status anxiety = fear of being homeless etc.. Yea then it's a very real phenomena of course, even if far less people will ever be homeless than lose sleep at night worrying about it.

[pinkytoe]

To me, one of the best insights of YMOYL was the importance of disregarding, at least in it’s material aspects, class norms or comparisons.

Yes!!
Perhaps in its most elemental form, humans seeking status of whatever kind is about fear of surviving or not. Finding your tribe so that you feel you belong somewhere and many time feeling superior too because that gives one the illusion of being at the top of the heap. Having lived six decades now, I can recall a time when it felt like there was a lot less of this income and class categorizing going on than there is now. You had a few rich people (who kept it very low key where I grew up), some poor, but mostly folks in the middle both socially and economically.

[ApatheticNoMore]

The smart thing if one was into winning the game (maybe one is just into getting rid of the game entirely, but that's a different thing - then one is an activist and not a social climber) is to see what class norms actually matter. If you are not going to get the job because of how you dress or any other aspect of your lifestyle than maybe that class norm MATTERS and isn't a class norm you can so nonchalantly ignore unless you have a lot of other markers that assure your class status and maybe you have very few ... if one was playing the game to win it, which I don't judge one way or other (except where truly unethical behavior is involved). It might go something like ignore the class markers that aren't easily seen (maybe not many see inside your house - so all your furniture is from the alley - ok ...), fully conform with those that will be seen, if one is trying to be a certain class.

[Zoe Girl]

The smart thing if one was into winning the game (maybe one is just into getting rid of the game entirely, but that's a different thing - then one is an activist and not a social climber) is to see what class norms actually matter. If you are not going to get the job because of how you dress or any other aspect of your lifestyle than maybe that class norm MATTERS and isn't a class norm you can so nonchalantly ignore unless you have a lot of other markers that assure your class status and maybe you have very few ...

I like this, I wanted to do many things with how I look. I got some tattoos, got my nose pierced, played around with the idea of hair color. Then I realized I didn't have as much social status as I once did. I was a divorced mom of 3. It seemed only married men wanted to sleep with me, not date. Most of my well-meaning friends drifted off into more comfortable relationships with other couples. My kids were called baggage, my family broken, myself damaged goods (yeah to my face). There was no social system to help me get a job anymore. I just didn't have friends who were in positions to help anymore. There was this recession and even people who used to have that type of life rarely did.

So I started to think I didn't want that. I had more to offer. And choosing clothes and other ways of appearance may actually matter. So I shifted, got a got in an urban school district, crawled my way up to a living wage, realized that the network of people seemed to mean more than blind resumes at some level of employment. I have my social markers still, I know how to dress well, I buy professional clothes even if I am at goodwill, I can speak well, present myself in front of a group, interact with many people at various social levels because I have had some experience with them. This way I get to influence things that matter to me, dressing like a punk-a** kid wasn't doing it. I struggle with playing a game (mostly now because it has been such slow progress) and sometimes just that I have this background that others don't. But if the game is how I make social influence then it is worth it.

[catherine]

I wonder what it is that compels people to construct these elaborate economic and cultural class taxonomies. With so many variables of dialect, professional identity, the artifacts we surround ourselves with, our sartorial, culinary and architectural preferences, why do we insist on creating these various categories? I’m not saying it isn’t real or not a common practice. I’ve seen military spouses trying to lord it over one another based on SO’s rank. Any gathering of academics I’ve ever attended has struck me as a ruthless struggle to establish one’s place in an invisible (at least to me) hierarchy.

My impression is that a lot of this is driven by status anxiety. People who engage in drawing class distinctions seem intent on claiming membership in the creative or professional or educated or meritocratic class. Otherwise they’re interested in letting you know about their ascension from one class to another. If we are in competion for status or perhaps the privilege that comes with it, there is something to be said for trying to posit a scoring system that favors you.

Well, if what you say is true, we might as well just throw out sociology studies across all the colleges in the country, because looking at these nuances in culture and economics is a science and the nuances are real. Someone else might not understand what the heck art history has to do with anything, too, but that doesn't mean it's bogus. You might be right if you called "Knitting in Florida" a bogus academic pursuit, but not sociology. I think it's fascinating, and I found this article really interesting, and my interest has no connection with status anxiety, because I'm too old to indulge in that. The last time I was looking to climb any ladders was when my husband made me go up one to clip the top of the hedges because he's afraid of heights. As for me, on neutral on whatever rung I'm on at the moment.

[ToomuchStuff]

*** when are you going to start offering some actual reasons for posting these links? Including some copied details from the article to make your case. I am not going to give my email address to (whoever) to read an article about (whatever).

Not to be unkind but I am getting to the point of simply ignoring your posts and new threads because they are so sensational with no opinion or comment from you to justify including them. I think that this is what some are calling clickbait however that is spelled.

I am simply making these comments to let you know. What you take from them is up to you.

Ayup.

Another hit-and-run post...

Should we replace the *** with bae? (mixed emotions, if you can't tell from the smiley's)

Wondering if you have been studying Clickbait with a group!?.